In a simplified scenario I have table T that looks somthing like:
Key Value
1 NULL
1 NULL
1 NULL
2 NULL
2 NULL
3 NULL
3 NULL
I also have a very time-consuming function Foo(Key) which must be considered as a black box (I must use it, I can't change it).
I want to update table T but in a more efficient way than
UPDATE T SET Value = dbo.Foo(Key)
Basically I would execute Foo only one time for each Key.
I tried something like
WITH Tmp1 AS
(
SELECT DISTINCT Key FROM T
)
, Tmp2 AS
(
SELECT Key, Foo(Key) Value FROM Tmp1
)
UPDATE T
SET T.Value = Tmp2.Value
FROM T JOIN Tmp2 ON T.Key = Tmp2.Key
but unexpectedly computing time doesn't change at all, because Sql Server seems to run Foo again on every row.
Any idea to solve this without other temporary tables?